


A Promise of Treasure

by in_a_blog_in_the_ground



Series: One-Shots [5]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-20
Updated: 2013-10-20
Packaged: 2017-12-29 22:28:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1010866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/in_a_blog_in_the_ground/pseuds/in_a_blog_in_the_ground
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bofur needs some cheering up, Nori thinks he has just the thing! </p><p>A treasure map, adventure, danger, etc!</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Promise of Treasure

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bofur1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bofur1/gifts).



> A one-shot adventure from a conversation between Bofur1 and me :)

“If we die, I’ll never forgive you!” Bofur shouted as they barreled through the tunnel.

“Yes you will! Ye always do!” Nori answered from immediately behind him.

“Well, I bloody mean it this time!”

-

_A week or so previously…_

Bofur’s head snapped up as Nori’s hand slammed a piece of paper onto the desk, inches from his nose.

“Nori! Wot the…” Bofur mumbled as he rubbed his eyes, trying to recover from the rude awakening.

“’Ave a look at that!” Nori said, beaming proudly.

Brushing the last strands of hair from his face, Bofur picked up the sheet and peered at it. “Wot exactly am I looking at?”

“Well, it’s a map, innit?” Nori said. “Picked it up in one of our raids.” He leaned against the table and poked through some of the papers littering its surface.

“An’ why…?” Bofur looked up from his perusal of the map, lifting a quizzical eyebrow at his friend.

Nori’s smile faded somewhat. He sighed. “Look, mate. Ye need t’get out of ‘ere. Ye bloody fell asleep at yer table again, in case ye ‘adn’t noticed,” Nori gestured to the workbench, strewn with sketches of designs and half-made models, evidence of Bofur and Bifur’s labors as the master toymakers of Erebor.

The sudden look of bewilderment followed swiftly by resignation that crossed Bofur’s face before he rubbed his hands over it again gave Nori all the answer he needed. “Heh. Yeh, Bifur let me in. ‘E wants ye out of ‘ere too, though ‘onestly it’s probably more so that he ken finally get t’his stuff,” he joked.

Even as he smiled, Nori worriedly watched his friend. Bofur was not his usual cheerful self. Lately he had been morose; working late into the night, and spending more time alone. Every year around this time, this happened, though never for very long; it was hard to keep a soul like Bofur’s down. This year seemed especially heavy though, for some reason. Nori had never been able to glean the entire story, but from what he could surmise from a few drunken late nights, it had something to do with a woman Bofur had to leave behind…

“So c’mon, what d’yah fink?” Nori tried again to bolster his friend.

“About what?” Bofur’s head had begun to nod down. One dark eye glared up at Nori.

“About the treasure!”

Bofur’s head came up again. The way to a dwarf’s heart is through his treasure. Nori was pointing at the map, and Bofur took a closer look.

“See? We would just ‘ave t’get through this pass ‘ere, then find a way in, probably ‘ere would work, an’ then, well, _find_ the stuff, an’ then we ken be on our way back! Matter of hours, I’d say! Once we got there, anyway.  So, ye in?”

“Ye…ye want me t’go with you?” Bofur kept looking between the map and his friend’s expectant face. The sheet of heavy parchment depicted a cave set high up near the tip of the Iron Hills mountain range closest to Erebor, just to the east. Runes scrawled next to the drawing promised hidden riches.

“Yes!” Nori threw up his hands in mock exasperation. “That’s wot I’ve been tryin’ t’say! Treasure, mate! Who knows wot could be there?” His eyes glittered with excitement. “So. You in? Or out?”

Bofur couldn’t help but smile at Nori’s enthusiasm. The former thief always had been one for adventure, and since they’d met, had tried to rope the toymaker into coming with him more than once. Part of Bofur wanted to agree immediately, wanted to leap at the chance for excitement and gold, but another part of him, the larger part at this moment, just wanted to stay at home, preferably in bed with a mug of tea. He sighed, and opened his mouth to start making excuses.

Before he could even begin, Nori stopped him. “Bofur! Snap out of it! We’re going. Yor not doin’ anyone any good sittin’ in ‘ere lookin’ like someun’ trampled yer precious hat. Look, ‘ere’s the fing,” Nori’s voice dropped down to a conspiratorial whisper. “I need a partner, see? Someun’ I ken trust. Yer one’a me best mates. Wotever we get, we split ‘alf an’ ‘alf, yeh? Whattya say?”

With Nori insistently in his face, quite literally leaning across the desk, there was little Bofur could say but: “Fine! Fine…”

“That’s it!” Grinning hugely, Nori scooped up his map and listed off certain instructions as he headed triumphantly for the door. “Pack fer maybe a week, week an’ a’alf on the road, but light, mind you. Bring some sacks, we’ll need ‘em fer the treasure. There’s some good huntin’ out there, we shouldn’t lack fer food, but mebbe ye could convince yer brother t’make us up a quick bag? Last time I asked last minute, he threw an onion at me ‘ead…”

Still blurry from the progression of events, Bofur managed to get off one quick thought. “But…But Nori, we’re Lords! We don’ need any more treasure!”

At the door, Nori whipped around and laughed before disappearing through the portal. “Bof’, when was that ever the point of this!”

-

Five days later, Bofur and Nori approached the pass that, according to the map, would take them through to the hill containing the promised treasure. It had been a mostly uneventful journey from Erebor; the most trouble they had encountered was from plains deer seeing their approach from far off and evading their valiant efforts to make lunch of them. Eventually, some of Nori’s traps had worked, and they now had enough smoked meat to last them through their exploration of the hills and partway back to Erebor, if all went well.

The air was quiet and still. No dwarves lived in this particular end of the range, and they had seen very few creatures since entering its boundaries. With only mild caution, the friends started forward through the pass. The walls pressed close several times, but nothing assailed them. The other end of the pass opened up to a small clearing of sorts, with the face of the targeted hill before them. Nori pointed out an opening about halfway up, and could pick out a path of sorts they could take. Storing some of their gear in a niche in the wall to be picked up on their return, they started climbing; Bofur using his mattock, and Nori using his iron-tipped staff to help themselves up. Soon enough, they reached the opening. Bringing a finger to his lips for silence, Nori crept forward first. Bofur waited at the entrance as Nori stepped into the darkness. After a moment, a light shone from the glowstone Nori brought out of his pouch to indicate the way was clear, so Bofur followed and caught up with the thief.

“Looks alrigh’,” Nori whispered, straightening up and puffing on the glowstone to make it brighter. The soft light illumated the bare stone walls of the cave they found themselves in. “Bit empty. Maybe we took a wrong turning?”

“Wait, I can feel a draft here,” Bofur said, his right-side braid fluttering slightly. He turned towards the sensation and Nori brought the glowstone closer, revealing a crack in the wall.

“Stand back,” Bofur warned, and swung his mattock at the crack. A few more solid swings, and a passageway was cleared.

Exchanging glances, the friends proceeded.

The tunnel widened as they traveled, and before long, they sensed a wider space coming up. At Nori’s touch on his arm, Bofur stood aside to let the spymaster go ahead first. He waited by the mouth of the tunnel and watched the glowstone held in Nori’s hand float in a few steps, and stop. It stopped because an answering glow had appeared from a few feet beyond that. As he continued watching, more and more puddles of luminescence joined the first until the cavern dimly glowed with faint green light. Bofur gripped his mattock tightly, unsure of what it all meant, but he remained still as he watched Nori, now illuminated slightly by the light. His features were calm as he slowly returned the glowstone to its pouch, but his eyes continued to flick about, taking in the situation.

The first glow that appeared rose from the floor of the cavern in front of Nori, stretching upwards from the floor ‘til the top of it reached the height of the dwarf’s peaked hair. Nori took a cautious step back, keeping his staff between him and it. Before their eyes, the shape gently pulsed and slowly began to change shape. Bofur watched astounded as it took on the vague silhouette of his friend, eventually separating out limbs, and taking on more detail, though the face remained blank.

Nori laughed in amazement. “Ha! Look, Bofur, it looks jus’ like me! It’s even got me bongy-knocker,” he said, gesturing to the long tube the form had made from one of its hands. “They must be some sort of mimic…” Nori continued to make appreciative noises as he inspected the creature.

Bofur was not as taken in. He watched as one closer to him took on his silhouette and shape, others copied _it_ , and so on until the cavern was eerily populated by faceless, glowing green representations of the dwarves. “Er, Nori,” he called out as he regarded the first one to have taken his shape, “Mebbe we should go. There’s nothing here, mate.”

“Wait a tic!” Nori was obviously fascinated by the things. “I wonder what these fings are? Can you speak? Hello? Guess not… They seem pretty ‘armless, I dunno if they ken even really-”

“MOVE!” Bofur cried, reaching forward.

Seeing the alarm on his friend’s face, Nori immediately leapt away from the shape, at the same time turning his head back to see what the fuss was. What he saw made him curse in surprise.

From the center of the green mass, a hole had formed, and from it, a dripping maw edged with teeth had shot out, snapping in the air as it lunged for Nori.

“Run! Bloody run!” Nori grabbed Bofur and shoved him into the tunnel as all around them the glowing forms pulsed and split, each revealing teeth-lined mouths, and lurched forward towards the dwarves. The mouths emitted hideous shrieks that made the teeth vibrate and rasp together.

“If we die, I’ll never forgive you!”

“Yes you will! Ye always do!”

“Well, I bloody mean it this time!”

Panting, they fled as the rattling screeches of their pursuers followed them. As the tunnel narrowed, Bofur fought a growing panic, but when they reached the crevice in the wall, Nori ran into his back and inadvertently shoved him through into the open cave they first entered. Reaching back, he pulled his friend through.

“Shhh, shh, quiet!” Nori hissed, grabbing Bofur’s arm. They listened, but could hear no sound.

“Well. That seems to be it, then. Let’s-”

Whatever Nori had to say was interrupted by the sudden and explosive arrival of the huge glowing mass from the crevice in the wall. Rock rained down as the wall crumpled, pushed out by seeking tendrils, each with a horrible snapping maw.

Cursing, Bofur and Nori pushed themselves up from where the explosion had thrown them, and pelted for the entrance. As the glorious circle of sunlight grew larger and larger, Bofur slowed, remembering the steep slope they had climbed to get there, but behind him, Nori showed no signs of braking.

“No time! Jump!”

Bofur stifled a yelp as Nori grabbed the back of his coat and launched them both out of the cave into open air just as set of teeth sliced above them. They performed an interesting run-slide the rest of the way down. At the bottom of the scree, they risked a look back up, and shared a collective sigh of relief.

The green tendrils were still snapping in and out of the cave, but shrinking back from the sunlight. A faint, pained hissing could be heard.

“Ha! Can’t stand the sun!” Nori laughed in relief.

“Well, then we better move fast, it’ll be twilight soon.” Bofur pointed out the lengthening shadows. More time than they had expected had passed while they were in the hill. Quickly recollecting their gear, Bofur and Nori exited the pass in a great hurry.

-

Camping that night on the plains, they settled into their blankets, more than ready for rest. Bofur’s eyelids were growing heavy, but then he felt Nori’s foot digging into his side.

“Hey. Hey, Bof’. Bofur. Are ye still awake?”

Bofur grumbled. “I am now. Whattya want?”

“Um.”

Bofur heard shuffling as Nori sat up. He sighed and did the same.

“There’s…there’s sumfin’ I should tell ya, mate.” Nori looked about as sheepish as it was possible for him to look. “Er. There never was any map.”

“What are you talkin’ about? It’s right there, stickin’ out yer pack. I can see it.”

“I mean…I never found it anywhere…I had Ori draw it fer me.”

“…What.”

Bofur was starting to realize what was going on, and Nori quickly put up his hands against the thunderous look growing on the toymaker’s face.

“Look, wait, hear me out! You _‘ave_ been out’a sorts lately, an’ you know it. I know you don’ want’a tell me the whole story, mate, an’ that’s alrigh’, but it kills me t’see y’this way. I f’ought mebbe a change o’scenery would cheer ye up, so I asked Ori t’elp me make a map of this place. I remembered the last time I been out this way, hearin’ rumors o’sumfin’ weird goin’ on. It cleared out all the dwarves used t’live ‘ere, so I thought mebbe there’d might been sumfin’ left be’ind. I was goin’a check it out meself, but then I f’ought, wouldn’t it be bett’a if we two done it, eh? Bit o’fun, bit o’craic. I didn’t fink there’d really be anyfin’ to it, much less great bleedin’ glow monsters! Wot was that all about, eh? Ah. I’m sorry I dragged ye out on this stupid bit o’curiosity wiv me. I’m sorry I almost get ye killed. Sorry…f’ought ye needed t’know…”

Nori looked truly remorseful, and Bofur’s expression softened. Then, to everyone’s surprise, he burst out laughing.

“Sorry? Sorry?! Nori, that was…amazing! That was…” Unable to find any words, Bofur began laughing again. Nori’s look of confusion also did not help. “Nori, that was the best bit o’craic I’ve had since the time we went fishing and caught that, whateverthatwas. I have the best adventures wiv you. Life-threatening situations seem t’be part of the bargain, but I’ve learned to accept that. It wouldn’t be as fun otherwise. So thank you. Yes, that was kind of-, that was an extremely stupid plan, but it’s just what I needed. Yer a good mate.”

With that, Bofur leaned forward and punched Nori in the chest. Nori rocked back from the blow, but laughed, and, satisfied that all was forgiven, Bofur and Nori settled back down to sleep. It had been a long day, but home was on the horizon.


End file.
